The Throes of Three Brothers
by supersmileys
Summary: Dealing with three brothers and Olaf was always a little bit of a struggle, but recent events meant that everything turned to custard all at once for Anders, Ty and Axl; leaving Mike to juggle with the prevention of his three brothers completely falling apart. And it's not easy when they set each other off. Set directly after the Season 2 finale, so there will be spoilers.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **Once again, just a quick spoiler warning!

I wrote this to fill the void as to what I thought might happen after the Season 2 finale, but I thought I may as well turn it into a proper story and give it a purpose rather than just have it fester on my computer to then perish once Season 3 came out.

And this time, my story about the Johnsons actually includes Olaf, yay!

* * *

As much as Mike Johnson griped over how he was always left to be the serious, responsible older brother, it was the thing in his life which gave him the most purpose. His family pissed him off at the best of times, but as of late he had felt closer to them than ever. Maybe it was because there were finally no major secrets left driving them away from each other. Whatever it was, it brought Mike more satisfaction than he cared to admit. It was a shame that it took three separate upheavals, one for each of his younger brothers, to bring them all together.

Anders was the brother who had experienced the biggest calamity. "Oh my God. Oh my fucking God," Anders said, sitting down and putting his head in his hands. It was finally beginning to sink in all that had happened to him lately. The whole damn debacle – Helen, her whirlwind entry into his life, the strange but powerful connection they seemed to have, her ability to better his business. Her _beautiful _tits. All that amazing sex they had. Then of course, bloody Natalie. She broke into his house, pointing a fucking _crossbow _at his chest! And Helen, beautiful Helen, had to reveal that she too was a goddess. Watching a woman get slaughtered in front of his eyes wasn't a sight he ever wished to relive.

And if that wasn't perverted enough, the goddess spirit of his dead girlfriend went beyond the grave to find another body to dwell in. It was rare, but it was on days like this where Anders wasn't so fond of being a god.

"You alright, mate?" Mike asked kindly as he settled down beside him, handing Anders a beer. There were just five people in Anders's office that evening – Anders, Mike, their other two brothers Axl and Ty and their very youthful looking grandfather, Olaf.

"What the fuck do you think, Mike?! My wife was murdered right before my very eyes, I nearly got killed with a fucking crossbow, and then the reincarnation of my dead wife turns up in the form of my idiot brother's flatmate," Anders snapped.  
"Hey, don't call me that, dickhead!" Axl interjected automatically, but he was met with a death stare from Mike. Mike was trying to keep the room under control, and petty arguments and name-calling were not going to help.

"Sorry…" he muttered, immediately regretting his outburst. The room was silent for a minute. Anders was perched on the edge of the couch, a look of disbelief etched into his face. On one side of him was Mike, and at the edge on the other side was Olaf. Axl was sitting in Anders' desk chair, and Ty was slightly further away, having pulled out a chair from the table in the middle of the office. Anders' problems seemed to have temporarily subsided into a stunned silence; the question was who was going to break next.

"At least you had a wife," Ty lamented, gazing miserably at the wall. Ah-ha. Wherever Anders went, Ty always followed. Even when he didn't want to, which was about ninety percent of the time. Poor Ty always seemed to be unhappy. It didn't help that he had been Hod, god of all things dark and cold. Because of him, the office often possessed a chill that wasn't normally present. On this occasion, however, the chill was purely figurative; he was upset because Dawn, the love of his life, literally had no memory of them ever being together or even who he was. Mike had little sympathy for Ty in this instance; he had brought it upon himself by going and turning into a mortal without first consulting the rest of his family. Ty's dilemmas were probably the most difficult to handle despite not being the most urgent matter; but Mike knew that Anders would knock his problems into perspective, as he was more than capable of doing.

"Yeah, and she's dead!" exclaimed Anders in frustration. He was pissed off with Ty's gloomy outlook at the best of times, but this raining on Anders' parade was a little too much. "And YOU had a wife – Loki's psycho daughter, remember?" Ty shot him a dark look. Eva, a goddess he had married, was killed by their mother. He preferred to shut her memory from his mind.

Olaf's head was cocked to one side, his mouth slightly open in bemusement. Or he may have been stoned; it was difficult to tell with him.  
"So, were the two of you actually married?" he asked slowly.  
"No, we were just pretending because we thought the batshit crazy bible chick would be more willing to conduct business with us. It was just a cover. FUCK!" Anders cried, taking the ring off his finger and chucking it across the room. It bounced a few times before rolling over to a wall.  
"It's okay to be upset, Anders," Mike said, taking a sip from his beer.  
"No, I'm not upset, I'm fucking pissed off!"

"Potayto, potahto," murmured Axl as he slowly spun in Anders' chair. He too, had faced a kick to the guts that day – it was Gaia (his flatmate and the girl he loved) who had assumed the new role as Idunn, the goddess spirit that had previously lived through Helen. This meant that it was now Gaia's destiny to fall in love with Bragi (Anders), leaving Axl forgotten and shit out of luck.

Except Anders, who normally loved beautiful women in all shapes and forms, had reached the end of his tether with the advent of a 21-year old embodying the spirit of his dead girlfriend. At least for now.

"This sucks! I mean, okay, she was bordering on the nymphomaniac control freak side, but she was _my _nymphomaniac control freak, you know?" Ty rolled his eyes. Ty himself had been intimately familiar with Helen once or twice before destiny reared its ugly head. "And once again the poet speaks words of wisdom."

Anders turned to Mike. "Why is he here? He's not even a god anymore. In fact, he should get the fuck out of here. I am in shock, and I am in mourning, and he should respect that."  
"Ty, be nice to your brother," Mike said tiredly. It was an expression he had used multiple times over the years when he was raising the two buggers. Even though it was normally him telling Anders to be nice to Ty, not the other way around. But as he took another swig from his beer, he couldn't stop a small smile crossing his lips. Mike decided that bickering was probably the best way to clear the air and help them grieve, so he wasn't going to interfere until he had to.

"He knew her for a week at most! And now he's rabbiting on about her as though she was the love of his life!" Ty taking digs and moaning about Anders was par for the course in their family. Even back when they were kids, Anders and Ty were constantly squabbling for their mother's attention. Mike was old enough to know better; that their mother would always love Ty a little bit more than the rest of them. He wasn't old enough to know that it was pointless to keep trying to please his father, though. Not until the bastard took off.  
"She may well have been the love of my life, but how am I to know now that the woman is dead?!" Anders snapped back in retaliation. He sighed dejectedly and sank back into the couch.

"Who's dead?" A sixth voice asked. The five men all ceased talking and their heads swivelled towards the direction of the voice. Dawn, Anders' assistant had just entered. She walked into the middle of the office.  
"Who died, Anders?" Anders looked glumly at the bottle in his hands as he formulated a lie in his head.  
"Helen's sister. Helen, uh – had to go back to Wellington to sort it out. And we also had a massive fight. I don't think she'll be back," Anders answered in a low voice. This was probably the first time that Dawn had seen proper emotion on her boss' face that wasn't jubilation, smugness or just pure arousal (he wasn't one to hide these sorts of things), and it concerned her greatly. She had to admit, she wasn't too sad to see the back of Helen, however. Helen had been a real bitch towards the end of their relationship, and the way she had managed to wrap Anders round her little finger had almost been sickening.

"Oh, no, Anders, I'm so sorry. Is there anything I can do?" It was strange, those four brothers. They seemed to be constantly plagued with romance issues. Mike had been dumped by his wife who ran off with her ex-fiancé, and Axl had been betrothed to a woman who ended up killing herself. Or something. She wasn't entirely sure how the relationship between the two of them had ended; something was foggy in her brain about the facts. God knew what kind of love life their cousin Olaf had.

And she knew bugger-all about Ty's love life, apart from the time he had turned up on her doorstep the first time they met and falsely professed his love for her. Not that she wanted to know anything about his love life, mind you. He seemed to be too much under Anders' thumb, having declared love for her on Anders' instruction. Then again, Anders had virtually everyone under his thumb; he could be damn persuasive at times, and each day she questioned to herself how he did it.

"No, no. You can go home, Dawn, I'm not going to get any work done today," Anders responded. He was still talking without any hint of a joke in his voice, which was rather uncharacteristic. He must really have cared for Helen.

"Oh, come here," she found herself saying, holding out her arms to him. Dawn half-expected Anders to reject her offer, but he stood up and hugged her, burying his head into her shoulder. It was the first real hug that they had shared; Anders had hugged her in the past, but it was generally a brief hug to hide the fact that he wanted her to do something unfavourable. Even more unexpectedly, he made no move to feel her up or undo her bra. She felt something else strange as well.

"Anders, are you crying?" At this, Anders swiftly pulled away from Dawn.  
"Okay, thanks Dawn, I'll see you tomorrow!" He swerved her around and ushered her out the door, shutting it behind her. He stayed at the door, not daring to turn around and face his brothers until he knew he was stable. Anders knew that Ty wouldn't care about him crying; he'd be too busy sulking over the fact that Anders still got to hug Dawn instead of him. But there was no way in hell he was going to let Mike know that he was as upset as he was. Selfish prick didn't deserve to see that. Even though he had been very considerate that afternoon, and even put Ty in his place, which made a nice change. Oh, and the fact that Mike risked his life to try and kill the woman that nearly ended his life had to be commended.

This was bullshit, he had only known her for a very short period of time, and here he was getting all upset about her! 'She was pretty spectacular, though,' Anders thought sadly. There were very few women who would ever be up for that much sex at any time.

"You're crying, Anders?" Axl was in disbelief. He didn't think he'd seen his brothers cry much before, if at all – Mike would never allow himself to look vulnerable in front of his younger brothers. Ty didn't tend to cry (although he was close the time that he nearly killed Dawn), he just went bitter and moody when he was upset. Anders? It dawned on Axl that maybe he didn't know his brother as much as he thought he did. Anders always seemed to be either happy or annoyed. This sadness was unfamiliar territory.

"No, I've just got the death of a goddess and a near-death experience in my eye," Anders retorted irritably. He cleared his throat meaningfully and turned around and came back to sit down on the couch. His eyes were red, but you could have attributed that to the scratchiness of Dawn's cardigan.

"Where's the weed at, Grandpa?" And so the self-destruction stage of grief had arrived. Time for Mike to jump in before it all went downhill. "Anders, I understand the desire to get completely shit-faced, but I don't think your office is the best place to do so. Why don't we all go back to the bar and indulge in the illicit activities there," Mike suggested. The last thing he needed was having to deal with stoned, depressed family members jumping into a car and endangering their lives. Best to keep them where he could look after them. As he always did.


	2. Chapter 2

Anders clearly needed a session in which to vent all his miseries, being one with words. He wasn't keen on the idea of leaving his office and his sanctuary, and he made this known to Mike, detailing his conditions.

"I'll go - as long as you make sure that the goddesses won't be there. The last thing I need is a reminder that Axl STILL hasn't found Frigg and that we're still on this stupid mortal earth." That was a smart move. In order to prevent spontaneous combustion between Anders and Axl, Mike needed to ensure that the goddesses stayed away from them for the time being. Mike nodded in agreement, and finally he, Anders, Axl and Olaf got up to leave. Only Ty still sat there, shock set into his face.

"What's going on, Ty?" Mike asked exasperatedly. He was so close to getting them all out the door and into a more familiar territory, and each of his brothers kept hitting a roadblock on the way. "What's going to happen when Odin finds Frigg? When the gods return to Asgard? You're all going to become gods, and then…I'll be left here on this earth, alone." Ty, for the first time, was starting to regret his decision to stop being a god. The thought of him no longer having his brothers, his grandfather, not even Dawn now that she barely knew him was overwhelming.

"See, Ty, this is why I made you promise that you would run your plan by us before doing anything! Look, we'll find Kvasir and see what he has to say. Let's just get going." It was difficult to juggle two depressed brothers at once, especially when the third was likely to get mopey again over Gaia's fate. Mike was eager to get his brothers to the bar, where he felt more in control. Or at the very least, he could serve everyone alcohol until nobody cared anymore. He shepherded them out the door and didn't leave until he was certain that every one of his family members were out of Anders' office.

Once back at the bar, Mike could breathe a sigh of relief. The smell of the wood in the bar was comforting, and he felt stronger there. It was going to be easier to deal with them all as there was more space, and more alcohol. Olaf, Anders, Axl and Ty each had their preferred seats which they had now settled into, and Mike went behind the bar to pull out some clean glasses. He had just poured everyone a stiff drink, when Michele entered the bar.

"NOPE," Anders said loudly, pointing his finger in the direction of the door. "No goddesses allowed. Get out." Michele inched forward slowly, crossing her arms.  
"_Excuse _me, dwarf?" She asked dangerously. 'Dwarf' had been her affectionate and condescending pet name for Anders, depending on her mood. Today was certainly not a day where she was feeling affectionate towards him. Mike hurried out from the bar over to her to prevent her from throttling his brother.

"I have the other three with me outside, and yes that includes newly christened Idunn who has been asking to see Anders ever since you all took off this afternoon. What do you expect me to do with them?" Michele whispered angrily to Mike. Mike reached out to brush the hair from her forehead. "Look, we just need a few hours to come to terms with everything. I have three brothers who are all down in the dumps for various reasons, and I want to give them a space to air their troubles without interruption. I'm sorry, I'll make it up to you later, I promise," he said softly, leaning in to kiss her cheek. Michele rolled her eyes.

"Fine, you pulled my leg. I'll be back later. _Alone_," she added in a alluring whisper into his ear. Mike smiled and kissed her again slowly. "I look forward to it." Michele turned and went back out the door; her coat slung over one shoulder.

"At least one of you is lucky in love," Olaf said, lighting up a cigarette. He was in blatant disregard of the fact that he was breaking the law by smoking in Mike's bar, but Mike decided that he would have to pick his battles. He would let this instance slide.  
"Lucky? Pah-ha! Mike's wife dumped him after she got knocked up by his best friend, and now he's shagging Loki's leftovers. I would hardly call that _lucky,_" Anders retorted, swiping a cigarette from Olaf and lighting up. Mike was more than a little miffed.

"I seem to recall that _you _were unable to get with Michele, Anders," Mike said, momentarily forgetting that he was supposed to be nice to his brother. Thankfully, Anders chose to ignore this comment, and exhaled forcefully from his cigarette.

"So, is Gaia going to be pining over Anders for the rest of her life? Until she gets with him and it ends badly for her? Can't he just get with her and then dump her straight away?" Axl asked his grandfather hopefully. He really wanted his old flatmate back, the one who loved _him_, not stupid Anders. Olaf simply shrugged.  
"God only knows."  
"Aren't you supposed to be the god who knows?! You are the family oracle!" It was hard for Axl to not let his irritation show. Olaf wasn't ruffled by Axl's frustration.  
"Well, what if she is? Then there's nothing you can do anyway, and thus you shouldn't worry. _Relax_, have a drink or six. Move on from Gaia and focus on finding Frigg. Because once you find Frigg, you're not going to care about Gaia anyway," Olaf coaxed in his slow, deep manner. This logic wasn't what Axl needed right now. He stood up huffily and started to head for the door in a strop.

"Where do you think you're going?" Mike asked warningly. It was as though Axl was a teenager again; when Mike and Valerie had basically been his parents. The memories that Mike's tone brought back stung - but all Axl cared about in that moment was getting the fuck out of the bar; away from his family and all that Norse god crap that he was completely over.

"None of your business," snapped Axl. He turned and continued making his way towards the exit.  
"Get your arse back here!" Mike snarled. His brothers were certainly determined to test his patience today.  
"Why should I? I'm Odin, and I can do what I like. You're not my dad!" Axl spat. The room was silent as his last comment sunk in. Mike wasn't Axl's dad, but he had been as good as, if not much better than their real father, who had been abusive and took off early on.  
"If that's how it's going to be, then fine – bugger off, you ungrateful little shit," Mike growled. Axl needed not another word of encouragement – he left the bar, slamming the door shut behind him.

"…So are we taking bets on how long it takes before he comes crawling back all apologetic?" Anders asked, trying to defuse the tension. Mike didn't even look at him; he was still glowering at the door from which Axl had departed. Ty had pulled himself from his wallowing to at least look concerned for his brothers.  
"Shouldn't one of us go after him?" He looked around the room, waiting for his family to respond.  
"You heard the almighty Odin, it's none of our business," Mike replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm as he angrily started pouring himself a drink.

"Look, Mike, I'm sure he didn't mean it. He truly appreciates what you and Valerie did for him for his whole life," Ty tried to comfort his brother. Despite his affinity towards self-pity about his life, Ty was the brother who was the least prone to hotheadedness (for more reasons than one). Additionally, Mike and Axl's exchange reminded him too much of the fights between his family members when he was younger.

It had normally been his brothers who had comforted him, so it was now Ty's turn. It seemed like a good start to make sure that Mike knew how appreciated he was. Or at least, distract him from the problem at hand.

"Hey, Anders…if Gaia is now the reincarnation of the goddess you're destined to be with, why are you so adverse to her?" Ty asked suddenly. "Aren't you supposed to be in love with her?"  
Anders sent a dark look in his brother's direction.

"Ty, is that really an appropriate question to be asking Anders right now?" Mike reprimanded. The distraction had worked!

"It's a fair question! Maybe these prophecies don't hold as much power as they're supposed to! Helen and Anders could have just hit it off because they're just as slutty as each other-" ("HEY!" Anders interjected) "-and Gaia only thinks she's in love with Anders because that's what everyone's expecting from her! She could still be the Frigg," Ty suggested hopefully. But then he remembered what it would mean for him if they really had found Frigg, and he sunk back in his seat.

"Believe me, she's not Frigg," Anders said knowingly.  
"Ingrid is a very good oracle, she's knows what she's talking about," Olaf agreed. "If she says Idunn is a constant goddess and is now using Gaia as a vessel, then that's what's happened."

"But how do you _know_ she's not Frigg?" Ty insisted to his brother. Anders downed his drink and turned to Ty, looking irate.

"Look, you want to know why I'm so upset? It's because Gaia has made me confused as fuck."

"Why would Gaia confuse you? What happened?" Even Mike was curious now.

Anders leaned forward and sighed.

"You all remember what happened when Gaia emerged as Idunn?"

* * *

_"My lord Bragi, it is I, Idunn." Gaia announced to Anders. Anders stared at her in shock, backing away slightly. Everything happening behind Gaia had promptly turned to custard. __"Oh, this is bullshit!" cried Jerome, sounding like a frustrated child. "This is all your fault!" he accused Axl. __  
__ "MY fault?! How is this my fault?!"__  
__"You stole Papatuanuku from us! Now we can't fulfil the prophecy!"__  
__ "Hey, our prophecy isn't fulfilled either!" Axl exclaimed. Jerome lunged for Axl, and they started scrabbling on the grass._

_"Maybe – maybe that's not such a good idea," Ingrid called over to the boys. Michele rolled her eyes and exited the river haughtily, leaving Stacey and Ingrid looking utterly helpless. Olaf, Mike, Leon and George were awkwardly trying to figure out how to stop Axl and Jerome from killing each other. Colin was just laughing maniacally at the situation. He took way too much joy from others' misfortune._

_"Fuck, I need a moment," Anders said, backing away from Gaia and briskly walking back to his car. Gaia followed him slowly, away from the commotion occurring at the riverside. No-one had seemed to notice that they had slipped away. Anders climbed into his car and slumped his head dejectedly on the dashboard. Dawn whenever she felt too overworked would attempt to breathe slowly and count to ten (before Anders would make fun of her and she'd stop), maybe that'd work. __As he breathed in and out very slowly, Gaia slipped into the front passenger seat of his car. _

_ "Whoa – Jesus! What are you doing?!" The last thing he needed right now was a 21 year old goddess in his car. Especially one who smelt as good as Gaia.  
__  
"Are you okay?" she asked him simply. He turned to look at her properly, and as they exchanged gazes, a strange, familiar wave of peace and desire washed over him. He had never noticed how beautiful she was before that day. And then she smiled. And he couldn't help but smile back. In that moment, he WAS okay._  


* * *

"Oh, you _didn't," _The disgust in Ty's voice had never been stronger. The look on Anders' face was one which Ty had rarely – if EVER – seen on his brother: guilt.  
"You had _sex _with your brother's flatmate? The one who he's in _love _with?!" Trust Ty to get all uppity about this. Anders knew this would happen.

"We didn't have sex! Well, not _entirely_, anyway…" The noise that Ty made reminded Anders of a cat being strangled. "I was upset! And I wasn't exactly going to pass up a desirable 21 year old flinging herself in my direction! For once I didn't have to talk her into anything."

"_Really, _Anders?" Mike wished it wasn't true. This threw a spanner in the works regarding happy families with his brothers. Not that he felt particularly sympathetic towards Axl at the moment.

"Was she good?" Olaf wanted to know. Anders gave a guilty little glance in his grandfather's direction which confirmed Olaf's suspicions. He had always thought, since he discovered that there were Maori goddesses, that they'd be particularly fiendish in bed.  
"I can't believe you! No, wait, scratch that, this is so typical of you, Anders!" Ty was too fed up with Anders to be sympathetic towards him.

"Do you think I like this? I don't _want_ to want to be with her! Why do you think I feel so shit? Because I'm not only insulting Helen's memory, I'm hurting Axl in the process!" Ander felt like shouting. It was grating how much people assumed that he _just didn't care _about other people. Anders just found it easier to hide it from people.

"Wait, you actually cared about Helen beyond screwing her brains out?!" Ty said sarcastically.  
"Oh, shove it up your arse, Ty!" It took a lot to get Anders truly angry, and Ty had just reached the limit. He slammed his glass on the counter where it miraculously avoided cracking.  
Mike was inclined to agree with Anders.  
"Ty, you need to pull your head in. Anders may have done something less than ideal, but it's been a rough few days. Your attitude is not helping anyone."  
"Oh, whatever," affronted Ty, standing up and following the same path his younger brother had taken earlier.  
"For fuck's sake, Ty, where are YOU going?" Mike's plan to keep them all in one place was falling through fast.  
"What do you care, I'm not a god," Ty sniped at his older brother.

"You're still our brother, and I hate seeing the three of you at ends with each other. You're supposed to hate me, instead." Never mind the fact that Ty was getting pissed off at Mike something that was his own bloody fault.  
"Oh, don't be a martyr, Mike," Anders and Ty said at the same time. Olaf found this highly amusing and started chuckling away. Never had the two brothers seemed more alike.

"More booze for everyone!" he crowed, and Mike obeyed, filling everyone's glasses up with whiskey. He pointedly held a glass out to Ty. With a sigh and a roll of the eyes, Ty sat back down beside Anders, taking the glass from Mike. The four of them clinked glasses and downed them in one go.  
"This doesn't make me feel any better," Anders said in a slightly slurred manner.  
"Fuck, I forgot how much alcohol burns," Ty added, twisting his glass with a bitter look on his face.  
"You're not meant to feel good, you're just supposed to forget," Olaf instructed. He was disappointed that his grandsons still had much to learn about how to properly use alcohol as medication. Ty and Anders were beyond achieving any happiness from their drinks; their next aim was to simply drink until it didn't hurt anymore.  
"Would more alcohol do the trick, Anders?" asked Mike. Anders stuck out his glass and pointed it at the strongest bottle of absinthe across the bar, nodding in its direction.  
"Yes _please_."

* * *

**A/N: **Yay for absinthe's legality in New Zealand! :/ It's not the drinking, it's how we're drinking.

Seriously. I'm a little concerned for their drinking as well. And in the next chapter, I won't be the only one concerned.


	3. Chapter 3

It was hard to keep track of time (and the amount of alcohol they were consuming), and the afternoon just seemed to carry on until Michele returned to the bar to find four of the five Johnson family members absolutely trollied, surrounded in a haze of different kinds of smoke; not all of them legal, she suspected.

"Come to terms with everything, have you all?" She couldn't believe their state. Mike's brothers and Olaf looked to be even worse off emotionally from when they started drinking.  
"You're just as tall as Helen," Anders told her. The four of them were sitting in a booth, and Anders looked like he could barely sit upright.  
"Man, if I knew that the last time I shagged her would be the last, I might not have ever pulled out," he lamented, shaking his head and banging his hand on the table for emphasis. Anders looked as though he was seriously considering banging his head on the table, too; his face was in a definitive pout. Ty swung dopily to his brother.

"You are truly the most revolting person I know," Ty said sincerely. Anders clapped a hand on Ty's shoulder.  
"Thanks, bro. That means a lot coming from you. I really appreciate it," he acknowledged, barely managing to get his sentences from his mouth. There was a 'thunk!' as Olaf passed out on the table.

"Anytime, mate, I really meant it. You need me to tell you what's what? I'm your guy," Ty replied, clapping his own hand on Anders' shoulder and giving it a friendly shake. Anders let out a laugh.  
"Look at us with our hands on each others' shoulders. We're officially halfway to gay now."  
"I'm not gay, you are," Ty retorted, but he either couldn't or wouldn't remove his hand from his brother's shoulder.  
"It's fun telling girls that you're gay, though. I do it all the time," Anders bragged. Not even alcohol could stop Anders from his favourite hobby – winding up Ty.

"I know, you told the love of my life that I was gay," Ty slurred in response.  
"Why do you even love her so much?" While this heart-warming conversation was taking place, Mike was just sitting staring very intently at the beer bottle he was nursing in his hands. His blue eyes were largely unfocused, and he didn't seem to notice that Michele had returned.  
"I love her because she's beautiful, and smart, and pretty, and she makes me laugh, and she's intelligent, and she's hot, and because I love her," Ty rattled off a list of qualities that he valued about Dawn.

"See, I already knew most of those things about her. Does that mean I love her?" Michele didn't know this Dawn woman, but she relished the idea of recording Anders' and Ty's conversation to show Dawn.  
"I don't know, are you sexually attracted to her? Because sometimes that's a good clue." Ty informed his brother. For all the sex Anders had, he really could be clueless about women. Hell, he was clueless about _himself, _having virutally no self-awareness of what an asshole he was.

Michele rolled her eyes. This was a pathetic sight to see. These almighty gods, completely tanked by a few glasses of alcohol. She thought it was cute how they thought they understood women, but it was also rather saddening. Sighing, she went over to the bar and poured herself a glass of wine. If she was going to have to wait for this to die down, she was at least going to enjoy herself. Michele figured that the way Anders and Ty were going, there was half an hour max before they went the same way as Olaf.

"If I'm being completely honest with you Tyrone, sometimes I am, yes. Especially when she's angry."  
"Well, that's how you know you're not in love with her. Because if you love her, then you'd be turned on when she's happy, not when she's angry."  
"But but I could still be in love with her," Anders insisted.  
"You can't be in love with her because I'm in love with her," Ty protested. Fucking Anders, he was ALWAYS stealing his stuff. "And you can't fall in love with your employee, that's just unethical," he added. _So there!_  
"It's my business, so I can decide if I want to be unethical if I like," Anders said, finally dropping his hand from his brother's shoulder.  
"Can't you be nice to me for once?" Ty moaned, dropping his forehead to the table.

"I tell ya what," Anders said, swinging a finger in his brother's direction.  
"If I ever sleep with Dawn, I'll let you have a threesome with us. Do we have a deal?" There was a pause. Struggling, Ty lifted his head to squint disapprovingly at his brother.  
He shook his head vehemently with disgust, and then slowed his head and switched to a fervent nod.  
"That. Means maybe," Ty told his brother. Michele let out a scoff from behind her wine glass and the two alert brothers shifted their attention to her.

"Oh, hi there. Don't let me get in the way of your incestuous fantasies," she snorted. She lifted her head to look at the man she actually cared for.  
"Mike!" she called. He inhaled suddenly, blinked and looked up, seeming surprisingly sober for how much alcohol he had consumed.  
"Oh, shit. What's the time?"  
"Time to send your brothers home. They seem to have drowned their sorrows enough." Michele answered, slipping off her stool and approaching the table slowly and deliberately.

"Where's everyone else?" Mike asked, struggling to get out of his seat.  
"They've all gone home. Even the new goddess. She's gone back to her flat."  
Anders brightened at this prospect; he could go home without worrying about making morally ambiguous decisions.  
"Ty, looks like we're being kicked out. Let's go and grab Axl and party somewhere else than this depressing shithole," he suggested, swaying in his seat.  
"We don't even know where Axl is," Ty pointed out, swaying just as much. He gripped Anders' shoulder to steady himself, but that was fruitless; the pair of them nearly toppled over.

"You two are in no state to go anywhere," Mike lectured. He was met by two sets of bloodshot glares.  
"Mikael, I am a grown man. I will go wherever I like, and where I like is back to my home. And I am taking my brother Ty with me," Anders announced. The pair of them had really grown a lot closer since Ty had lost his god powers. Mike initially thought this was a good thing, but he was starting to think that he preferred them when they hated each other.  
"Do I have to?" Ty whined; it was as though they were children again.  
"Ty, you are depressed and gloomy and vulnerable-" That last word was a test of Anders' drunken tongue "-and I need to make sure that in this state you do not do something stupid like call Dawn."

"And how do you think you plan on getting there? No taxi is going to take the both of you in this state, and you sure as fuck aren't driving home." For Mike, there was nothing as sobering as having to take care of his dipshit brothers. He was officially done looking after them for the day.

"Easy! I'll call Dawn and have her pick us up," Anders said, pulling his phone from his pocket. Michele let out a condescending laugh, shaking her head.  
"I'm going upstairs. Mike, you better be up soon," she warned seductively.

"How come you get to call Dawn and I don't?" Ty wanted to know.  
"Because I am her boss and I can call her when I like." Dawn had picked up on the other end.  
"Dawn! Can you come pick us up please. Me and my brother Ty."  
"…Okay, where are you?" Dawn sighed. Normally, she would have rejected his request purely to give the Anders the impression that she had a busy social life, but it sounded like Anders was beyond caring.

"At the bar."  
"_Which _bar, Anders, there are several hundred bars in Auckland!"  
"My brother's bar. Emily Place. Like your mum's name."  
"Her mum's name is Mary," Ty hissed loudly at the same time Dawn automatically corrected her boss with "My mum's name is not Emily, it's Mary. Wait. Was that Ty? How does he know my mum's name?"

"Oh I don't know, Dawn, maybe he slept with her. I'm not my brother's keeper."  
"I didn't sleep with her! I didn't sleep with her, Dawn," Ty tried to shout down Anders' cell phone. Anders pulled his phone away from his face.  
"You went to Waikato University. Putaruru is in the Waikato. How do we know you didn't sleep with her?"  
"_I didn't sleep with her!" _Anders and Ty were obviously completely sloshed. They started bickering at each other, momentarily forgetting that Dawn was still there on the other line.

"Anders. ANDERS!" Dawn shouted, and Anders went back to the phone.  
"Yes, Dawn, deary, how can I help you?"  
"Stay there. I'll come pick you two up. Good God."  
"Ahhh, thanks Dawn, you're a goddess," Anders said gratefully before hanging up.

"Wouldn't it be bloody ridiculous if she was actually a goddess?" The depressing thoughts seemed to cascade upon Ty when he was drunk.  
"She's over 21. We'd know if she was a goddess by now." This time it was Mike who answered. Olaf let out a loud snore that echoed through the bar. Ty moodily put his head down on the table and didn't lift it until Anders was shaking him.  
"Dawn's here, let's go." Ty had fallen asleep for about half an hour; he felt more sober, only he now had a massive headache to accompany it.

"Oh, fuck," he muttered, lifting his head with a wince.  
"If either of you throw up in my car, I will expect a new car and a raise," Dawn threatened her boss and his brother.  
"Deal," Anders agreed, and the three of them stumbled out to Dawn's car. Anders and Ty collapsed into the backseat without any regard to backseat seating etiquette, nor seatbelts.

"Alright. Ty, where do you live?"  
"No no no Dawn, we're going back to my place."  
"Well, that makes my life easier, I can make sure both of you don't try to kill yourselves in one place." Dawn said sarcastically. This break-up seemed to bit hitting Anders pretty damn hard. But she had no idea why that gave his brother the liberty to hit the bottle so hard as well. Perhaps it was a Hawke's Bay thing.

"You're going to feel rough tomorrow," Dawn said, glancing in the rearview mirror as she pulled out of the parallel car park on the street.  
"I feel rough now, so why should that stop me from drinking?" Anders mumbled into the seat that his face was pressed up against.  
"And I won't be coming into work tomorrow." Dawn screwed up her face in annoyance. Anders always did this. Bailing on her, usually leaving her instructions and ridiculous requests to do on her own.

"So there won't be much point in you going in, either." What? Giving her the day off? Something was seriously wrong with Anders. She braved another glance in the backseat. Her eyes met Ty's, and the pair of them hastily looked away. He seemed a lot more sober than he had seemed when she heard him over the phone. In addition, he had actually shifted into normal seating procedure for a fast-moving vehicle; he had even put his belt on.

Dawn gave a little smile when she realised that he had also put the belt on his brother, which couldn't have been easy given Anders' position of being half sprawled across the backseat. Maybe she had been wrong to judge Ty.

"You're still paying, me right?" Her question was met with a low groan from the backseat.  
"I think that means, yes absolutely, with overtime and an extra day off," Ty said deviously.  
"Hah. If I tell him that he said that, will you act as my witness?" Dawn asked dryly. Ty grinned in spite of his headache.  
"Absolutely."

"Are you talking about me?" Anders could sense when people were talking about him normally, but his senses were off in this state of inebriation.  
"Ty was just giving me directions to your house," Dawn answered smoothly.  
"Oh." Clearly Anders wasn't sober enough to remember that she had actually been to his house multiple times.  
"He isn't normally like this when he's drunk," Dawn observed in a low voice. Ty looked over at his older brother.  
"Well, I think it's a combination of his utter heartbreak and the fact that Mike was shovelling whiskey down our throats rather than Anders' favourites of wine and vodka." Dawn nodded appreciatively.

"I think the absinthe, pills, marijuana and cigarettes may have had something to do with it as well," Ty listed. Dawn swerved in shock and the car violently lurched for a few seconds.  
"Oh, my God! How is he not convulsing on the floor, or in a coma?!"  
"My brother is a bit of an enigma when it comes to illicit substances; no-one quite knows how he works," Ty mused, casting a gaze out the window.  
"Well, I'm glad he called me. It would have been a disaster if he had planned on driving home in this state. And how are you not much, much worse off?"

"I just stuck to the alcohol; I'm getting out of a bit of a detox, so the whiskey was enough for me. Anything else probably would have killed me," Ty lied a little sadly. Dawn had no memory of the many dates they had had where they had tried all sorts of exciting and different wines (and also some… _interesting _experimental wines; New Zealand had a very diverse viticulture). Ty had still been dealing with the strong effect that alcohol had on him now that Hod had left his body.

"Oh," Dawn sounded surprised, "What kind of detox?"  
"Oh, I just tried giving up coffee and alcohol for a bit, just to see if there was any noticeable difference to my health. And I'm not fond of the drug scene. I'm not exactly the radical type." If Ty had to reinvent himself for Dawn, he thought he may as well keep quiet the period of his life where he was married and frequently indulged in questionable substances with his now late wife.

"And did it work?"  
"Uhh, some? But then it became too much of a drag. My brothers were having none of it."  
"You mean Anders was having none of it," corrected Dawn.  
"Well, the others as well. Mike owns a bar, for God's sake, and Axl is 22 so he doesn't know what the word sober means. And don't even get me started on our cousin Olaf," Ty said a little bitterly.

"Sounds like you're the only sane one," Dawn remarked. This evoked a smile from Ty.  
"You might be right," he said, looking at her in the mirror. She looked back at him, and returned his smile. She was really finding it difficult to find him creepy and strange. Anders HAD assured her that he was a good guy, but she was generally inclined to distrust his suggestions. Some of the time. Other times, his strange logic seemed to make perfect sense.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Pressure's on! I don't know how much longer I have with this story before Season 3 comes out and this all becomes irrelevant.**

**This chapter is quite dialogue heavy; I sort of got into a swing of pretty much transcribing their exchanges instead of working on furthering their story, but the next chapter will have more of Axl's problems and the awkwardness with Gaia and will hopefully flow a lot nicer!**

* * *

Dawn pulled up and parked her car in Anders' driveway. Ty undid his seatbelt and slowly climbed out of the car; he was still rather woozy.  
"Are you alright?" Dawn asked.  
"Yeah, I think I just need some water and a panadol to get rid of this headache," Ty replied with a slight wince. He walked around to the other side of the car and opened the door to help his brother out. Anders groaned in pain as Ty gently tugged him to his feet, like he had done many times before over the years.

"Where the fuck am I?"  
"You're home, now, brother."  
"Thank Christ for that, Mike was being a real downer."  
"Mike is _always _a downer, that's his job," Ty pointed out as he put Anders arm round his shoulder and helped him walk to the door. Dawn wasn't sure whether she should have offered to help Ty, but they seemed to be having a sweet brotherly moment and she didn't want to interfere.  
"Is Axl okay?"  
"He buggered off in a huff, remember? Don't know where he went." The alcohol and drugs had been particularly hard on Anders' memory this evening; although that was probably the intention. Olaf had clearly succeeded this day.

"Jesus, he gets more and more like Mike every day," Anders said, shaking his head in disbelief (was there even a bit of pride in his voice?).  
"Well, Mike did pretty much raise Axl," Ty reminded him. They had opened the door and were now slowly hobbling up the steps, Dawn slowly following behind them. She kept her head down, trying to conceal a smile. She hadn't seen this much humanity from Anders in a long time. Dawn had no idea that he cared that much about his family.

"Yeah. Oh shit, did I have any cigarettes tonight?" Anders wasn't a frequent smoker, but he had been trying to do it less.  
"You had a fuckload. Plus some of Olaf's marijuana, a bunch of those pills you always seem to have on you, and you managed to talk Mike into opening a bottle of absinthe," Ty sounded impressed that his brother wasn't dead.  
"How the fuck did I manage that? Normally I can never sweet-talk Mike into anything!"

"He was being nice to you because of your break-up with Helen." At the mention of her name, Anders stopped in his tracks.  
"Oh shit!" he yelled, and ran back down the stairs.  
"Anders?!" Dawn hurried after him, Ty stumbling behind her.

Anders started throwing up violently in the garden, falling to his knees.  
"Anders? This looks quite bad, maybe we should call an ambulance?" Dawn suggested worriedly, kneeling down beside Anders. Ty nodded, and pulled out his phone to call an ambulance. He then considered leaving a message for Mike, but remembered that Mike wouldn't have been able to drive anyway.

Thankfully, the ambulance arrived just in the nick of time. Anders had stopped vomiting and had finally completely passed out outside his house. Dawn's attempt to rouse him hadn't been successful, and she was starting to panic. The paramedics put Anders on a stretcher and loaded him up.

"Do you want to go with him?" Dawn asked; her voice was shaking with worry.  
"No, you go. I'll make sure to contact everybody else and grab some things for him."  
"Wait – how will you get to the hospital?"  
"I'll call Axl and get him to take me," Ty improvised quickly.  
"Okay, I'll see you soon." Dawn climbed into the ambulance and it raced off, sirens blaring.  
Ty then made a call to his younger brother, who answered after three rings.

"What do you want?" Axl asked irritably.  
"Look, I get that you're upset, you need to get your arse round to Anders' house right now, your brother's in hospital."  
"Shit, what happened?"  
"I think he'll be fine, just overindulged in the drinking, but there are more important things to do – I think Helen was killed here. I need your help cleaning up."  
"Aw, _fuck,_" Axl moaned. "Okay, I'll bring some cleaning supplies over."

Axl arrived promptly, parking behind Dawn's car. Ty was sitting on the step outside.  
"Where did you get to?" Ty asked curiously as they went inside Anders' house.  
"I just went home. And then Gaia turned up, so I was actually pretty happy that I had an excuse to leave the house," he admitted. Ty gave a nod.

It became immediately evident that Anders was a genius to distract attention from his house. There was a large pool of blood trailing from the door into the kitchen, where it culminated underneath the body of Helen. Ty was anticipating this, but the actual sight of her body covered in blood brought back some unexpected emotions and memories. He bolted from the room and into the bathroom, where he promptly threw up.

It had reminded Ty of finding his wife Eva and watching her die in front of him. It reminded him of the disgust and sorrow he had felt upon learning that Helen was destined to fall in love with Anders. He had had very strong feelings for her; she was the first goddess he had had sex with. But worst of all, the sight of Helen's dead body reminded him of the horror he had felt when Dawn had nearly died twice because of him. It was also about time the alcohol expelled itself from his body.  
When he had finished, he slumped to the ground and tried really hard not to cry. Axl came in, and seemed alarmed at the sight of his brother on the floor in such anguish. He quickly recovered, and climbed down to sit beside his older brother.

"That's how we all would have felt if you had gone through with killing yourself," Axl said quietly. Ty tipped his head and gave it a deliberate bang against the wall to stop the tears.  
"Fuck, Axl, now's not the time to talk about that," he growled shakily. Axl didn't respond, he just handed Ty the glass of water that he had grabbed from the kitchen. Ty accepted the glass gratefully and downed it in one go.

"I thought I'd be okay seeing it, but it just brought back so many bad memories," Ty confessed after they had sat in silence for a few minutes.  
"Seeing a dead body is not exactly something we're meant to be comfortable with," Axl said wryly. Ty rubbed his eyes tiredly.  
"I know…and I was probably the worst person to be here to clean it up," Ty agreed.  
"Especially when you're still pissed," Axl teased. Ty let out a laugh.  
"Yeah, that probably doesn't help. Thanks for being here, Axl," he added sincerely.  
"No worries, bro."

They eventually both got up and started with the slow clean up of Anders' house. Ty had learned a few tricks from when his mother had killed Eva, and he put them to good use in cleaning up Helen's body. Axl had called Mike, and went to go pick him and Olaf up, which was good as Ty didn't feel like explaining how he knew how to clean up a body so well. They had also touched base with Dawn who had informed them that Anders was in the process of having his stomach pumped, but that he would otherwise be fine.

By the time Axl had returned with Olaf and Mike, Ty had finished cleaning. He sat himself down on the couch and allowed the shock of everything that had happened that day to wash over him. His head was still pounding, but he didn't fancy his chances at taking a Panadol before he could be sure it wouldn't have an adverse effect.

"You and Anders did some quick thinking, keeping Dawn away from the house like that," Mike congratulated on his arrival. Ty let out a sigh.  
"It was all Anders. I wouldn't have even remembered that she was killed here."  
"You did good, mate," Mike insisted, gripping Ty's shoulder tightly for a few seconds.

"What are we actually going to do with the body?" asked Olaf.  
"Take her back to my place and put her in the freezer. We'll deal with her later," Ty said slowly. If Axl was annoyed at having to ferry his brothers back and forth, he wasn't showing it.  
"Why don't we drop her off at Ty's place, and then go straight to the hospital? Ty, have you got the gear you promised you'd bring Anders?" Ty leapt up, having forgotten, and quickly put together a bag of clothing items and toiletries for his brother. The other three carefully picked up the now-wrapped up Helen and cautiously took her out to Axl's car, putting her in the boot.

Once they stepped inside the door, Ty thought they were safe. That wasn't quite true.  
"What's that?" Shit. Ingrid was still living there.  
"This is Helen's body, we're keeping her in Ty's freezer for the time being," Olaf said helpfully as they carried the body over to the door.  
"Oh! Oh, well that's…that's good I guess," Ingrid faltered. Ty opened the door to the freezer for his brothers.  
"Holy fuck it's cold in here! I finally see what you guys were all talking about."  
Mike rolled his eyes, and Helen was placed carefully in the corner of the freezer before they all left, leaving Ingrid looking utterly bewildered as to what she was supposed to do about the situation.

"So I'll just...I'll just leave her in there, shall I?" she said to no-one.

Ty breathed a huge sigh of relief as Axl drove them to the hospital.  
"That was a close one."  
"Dawn totally would have thought that Anders killed her," Axl said. Ty shuddered at the thought.  
"That would have been drama we didn't need."

* * *

By the time they had arrived at the hospital, the stomach pumping procedure on Anders had already finished. They went into his hospital room, where Dawn was waiting on a plastic chair.  
"There you guys are! I was beginning to worry!" She directed most of this to Ty. Mike, Axl and Olaf approached Anders' bedside.  
"How are you going, mate?"  
"Fucking terrible. I would not recommend getting your stomach pumped to anybody. My throat is raw and painful, and my stomach feels like it has been scraped of everything that is good in the world."  
"Isn't that kind of the point?" laughed Axl. He then spotted what the doctor had left on Anders' bedside.  
"And they left you pamphlets! Do they think you're an alcoholic or something?" Anders gave his brother the finger.

"It's a good thing that you were going home with him, Ty, otherwise he could have choked on his own vomit and died," Dawn said, watching Ty with questioning eyes.  
"Oh, so he's the hero of the story?!" Anders sounded miffed that attention was pulled away from him.

"You were so much nicer to me when you were being poisoned by drugs and alcohol," Ty said in a mock-wistful voice.  
"It's a shame it couldn't last," said Dawn.  
"Are they going to let you go?" Axl wanted to know. Anders shook his head and rolled his eyes.  
"No. The bastards want to keep me under observation for 24 hours before they'll let me go anywhere."  
"Well, it's a good thing you weren't planning on going to work tomorrow, Anders," Dawn said brightly.  
"It's not much better being locked up in a hospital, though," Anders grumbled.  
"The ONE plus side is that I shouldn't have a hangover tomorrow due to receiving constant intravenous fluids."

"What about your catheter?" asked Mike, gesturing to a plastic bag hanging off the side of the bed. Anders leapt up to double check that his brother wasn't winding him up.  
"Oh, fuck, no, I did not authorise this. Dawn, when did they shove a catheter up my dick?!" Axl and Ty tried to stifle laughter as Anders demanded an answer from his employee.

"They must have done it when you were under local anaesthetic. I had nothing to with it," Dawn reassured him.  
"That's going to hurt like hell when they pull it out," Axl said with a massive grin on his face.  
"Will it affect my ability to have sex?" Anders sounded truly worried.  
"Are you planning on having sex soon, given your fresh break-up?" Dawn sounded unimpressed.  
"There are some very desirable doctors and nurses around this hospital, Dawn, I'm not going to let some silly emotions prevent me from having a good time!" Anders was truly back.

"I'll make sure that Michele is sent to pull it out. She'll be gentle," Mike cracked to Olaf, who snickered at the thought.  
"Mike, I swear to Axl, if you get her involved, I will kill you. I will not allow her anywhere NEAR my dick," Anders threatened, but he knew the balance of power was not in his court. Mike smirked.  
"You better be nice to me, in that case, little brother."

"You know, it's a lot easier to be nice to you when you aren't actually here," Anders retorted. "You guys probably have better stuff to do." Mike looked at his watch.  
"Yeah, Michele wasn't too happy that I left her behind. Are you okay with us leaving you?" Anders waved a hand dismissively.  
"Sure. You go and get laid; someone should in this godforsaken family. And Axl," he added, "Please do me a favour and do NOT, under any circumstances tell you know who that I'm here."  
"You know I wouldn't," Axl insisted. Axl didn't want his flatmate to spend time with Anders anymore than he did.

"Right then. Who am I taking with me?" he asked the room at large.  
"Dawn and I will stay behind for a bit and keep Anders company," Ty said, and then he looked to Dawn. "Sorry, if you don't want to, I didn't mean to assume, I just-" Dawn cut him off.  
"No, no we'll stay. And we can share a taxi back to Anders' to pick up my car," Dawn said with a smile.  
"You sure? I can come pick you guys up later if you like?" Axl offered, but Ty shook his head.  
"Nah, I think we'll be okay."  
"Ooookay then," said Axl, and he, Olaf and Mike left the hospital room. Ty pulled up a second hospital chair up to Anders' bed.

"Dawn, can I get you a coffee?" Dawn smiled at his offer.  
"A flat white would be lovely, thank you!" Ty stood up, smiling.  
"Good. I'll be back." Anders stopped him in his tracks with a very deliberate clearing of his throat.  
"Hello? Ever consider the fact that I might want something?"

"You've just had your stomach pumped, you're not meant to eat or drink anything for 24 hours," Ty replied matter-of-factly.  
"Bullshit!"  
"No, really, it's on your chart," Dawn confirmed, picking up the chart and handing it to Anders.

Anders read the chart and chucked to the end of his bed. "UGH!"  
Dawn reached down to her purse and pulled out a few coins.  
"Here, Ty, before you go get the coffees." Ty shook his head.  
"No, don't worry about it, I've got this." And before Dawn could protest, he slipped out off to the cafeteria.

"You know, I may have to start believing you about Ty being a nice guy," Dawn stated to Anders. He rolled his eyes.  
"Yup, he's a good man, my brother. He was always our mother's favourite."  
"Really?" Dawn knew absolutely nothing about the Johnson parents (Anders NEVER mentioned them to her; she suspected what he had told Natalie was a fabrication), so this was fascinating for her.

"You bet. When Axl came along, he would always help her out with the baby, and they were very close. Mike was too much of a moody teenager at that point to be close to Mum."  
"What about you? What about your father?" Dawn couldn't help herself asking.  
"Well, I kept to myself mostly. And Dad took off when I was 12. So I don't really count him as part of our family."  
"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry."

"He was a bastard anyway. We were better off without him." And before she could say anything else, he changed the subject.  
"How's your cat, Dawn?" He knew _exactly _the right topic to completely distract someone from the topic at hand. Dawn instantly bristled in her seat.  
"I don't _have _a cat," she said through gritted teeth for what was probably the thousandth time.  
"Why is that, Dawn? I would have thought that a self-sufficient, independent woman such as yourself would be more than willing to have a smaller being in your household to take care of," Anders said, leaning back against his pillows. Dawn rolled her eyes.

"If this is you trying to butter me up, I'll have you know it's not working," she said to her boss. Anders stuck both hands behind his head.  
"Now, why would I do that, Dawny?" he seemed to be amused by the situation. That smug smile on his face was both infuriating and brightening.  
"I don't know, maybe there's a horrible task you want me to do?"  
"Like what?" he asked coyly. Anders enjoyed Dawn telling him straight up where he was acting like an asshole, and he'd often try and draw out her sassy side.

"I don't know, like any one of a million awful things you've made me do in the past. Like the time you sent me to get the surveillance footage of Rosie through whatever means possible!" Anders finally stopped taking the piss of the situation; he leaned forward with interest.  
"I've been meaning to ask, how DID you get that tape?"  
Dawn opened her mouth to angrily retort that Anders had messed up priorities, but she stopped short when she realised that she had no earthly clue what she had done to get the tape.

"I-I don't remember," she said, half to herself, her tone of quiet bewilderment. Anders frowned at her in confusion, but comprehension dawned on him when Ty re-entered the room with coffee. The extent of which Ty had erased himself from Dawn's memory seemed to be expansive.  
"Here you are, Dawn," Ty said happily, handing her the coffee. He hadn't had coffee since he had ceased being Hod, and he was eager to try it again. Dawn accepted the coffee gratefully. "Thank you, Ty, you really didn't need to pay for it!" Ty waved the comment off dismissively.  
"Don't worry about it. Consider it a thank you for picking Anders and I up," he suggested. Dawn nodded and smiled at him.  
"Alright, I will."

Ty took a quick sip from his coffee. "Oh my God!" he exclaimed.  
"I warned you that you've got to wait for your coffee to cool down before you drink it, Ty, you should know this by now," Anders said sarcastically.  
"No, it's not the heat, it's the _taste," _Ty marvelled, holding up his cup so he could examine it closely.  
"It can't be that good, we're in a hospital," said Anders. "Dawn, tell me what it actually tastes like." She took a sip.  
"It's not bad," she said diplomatically. It was atrocious, actually, but she didn't wish to dishearten Ty when he had bought it for her.

"Maybe it's just because I really needed a coffee," Ty conceded, throwing a filthy look in his brother's direction.  
"You know, I think preferred you two when you were drunk and nice to each other," Dawn said cautiously from behind her cup. Not that she wasn't enjoying the company of her boss and his brother.

"I never heard back from Natalie, either," Dawn informed her boss. "I don't really want to try and give it another go, but I've gotten the impression she doesn't want to do business with us." Anders winced; yet another explanation to deal with.  
"She sent me an email – she's taking her business to Argentina," he lied regrettably.  
"She didn't even reject us in person? How rude! And after all you and Helen did to show off the business – sorry," Dawn faltered once she realised that she had hit a touchy subject. Anders shrugged it off.

"It's okay. She was a frigid bitch anyway."  
"That's kind," Ty said sarcastically.  
"What? She was!" Anders said defensively. He had spent the good part of a 30 hour journey trying to get her to sleep with him, to no avail.  
"And I suppose you'd know all about it," Ty retorted bitterly.

"Are you two _always _like this?" Dawn was unsure as to whose side she was supposed to take. Anders she had known for years, but Ty seemed to think more like her.  
"You mean, have I always been disapproving of the way Anders treats women? You bet." Dawn let out a laugh. Where had this man been all her life?


End file.
